Learn how to help our animal friends in ninth installment of Singapore Zoo’s wildly popular event

At the Rubbish Raft station, learn howyou can help reclaim the habitat for wildlife bykeeping rivers free from trash.

Singapore, 8 May 2013 — Zoolympix is back with a resounding bang in 2013! This time, each participant is transformed into a “Rescue Ranger” and gets to learn first-hand how habitat destruction and poaching are driving many animals to extinction. Leaping into its ninth year, Zoolympix will feature six exhibits in the zoo that will double up as interactive game stations. This series of challenging “rescue missions” will test young rangers’ memory, accuracy and agility.

With the zoo also celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, nuggets of historical knowledge will be incorporated into a journey that will both educate and entertain. Participants will learn little-known trivia about some of the zoo’s landmark moments since its opening in 1973.

In addition, stand to win attractive lucky draw prizes that include wildly popular zoo experiences. First prize is a one-year Friends of the Zoo Family membership and 2D1N Sleep with the Beasts Camp, worth over $800 for a family of two adults and two children; second prize is a 4-in-1 Park Hopper family package for two adults and two children and a 3-day Zoo Explorer Camp for one child worth over $600; and third prize is a 3-in-1 Park Hopper and Jungle Breakfast package for two adults and two children worth over $300. Top three winners also win a year’s subscription to Wildlife Wonders, Wildlife Reserves Singapore’s in-house magazine.

Pop into the awareness booth to find out more about endangered local wildlife, and learn what the ‘real’ Rescue Rangers at Wildlife Reserves Singapore parks (meaning the keepers) do to protect these animals. If you’re lucky, you might even get to meet a pangolin! While you’re there, indulge in a spot of face-painting or badge-making. Young readers are also free to browse our educational publications — available in English and mother tongue—and newly-published books about pandas.

Learn more about threatened wildlife atthe Zoolympix Awareness Booth, and you mighteven get to meet a pangolin!

Rescue Ranger StationsOn Thin Ice
Venue: Frozen Tundra
Climate change is causing the Arctic ice to melt! Help a polar bear find its lunch by hopping between fragmented “ice” pieces to pick up as many seals as possible within 30 seconds.

Seed Seekers
Venue: Tropical Crops (Pavilion opposite Cat Country)
In a world where deforestation is rampant, Rescue Rangers must collect and save the seeds of tropical plants which could be in danger of extinction. Track down plants in the Tropical Crops exhibit and “collect” their seeds by making a shading from the embossed plaques next to them.

Forest Storeys
Venue: Fragile Forest
The first step in wildlife conservation is to understand it better. Test your memory and learn more about animals and their rainforest homes by placing the creatures in the correct layer of their rainforest habitat in 30 seconds.

Rubbish Raft
Venue: Rainforest Kidzworld (Tugboat area)
Make a difference for the many fish, birds, frogs, and other wildlife friends by helping to keep rivers clean. In 30 seconds, scoop out floating rubbish in the water while standing on a raft and do your bit to reclaim the habitat for these river dwellers!

Penguin Eggs-pedition
Venue: African penguin exhibit
African penguins have nowhere to lay their eggs, now that the guano they use as nesting material has been harvested for fertiliser! In 30 seconds, sort penguins’ eggs into colour-coded “igloos” that ingenious scientists have provided as shelter for the eggs.

Stop Those Smugglers!
Venue: Sun bear exhibit
The smallest bear in the world needs to be saved from poachers! Stop sun bear smuggling by ringing in the pesky poachers. Toss rings over as many cone ‘smugglers’ as possible in 30 seconds.

Singapore, 28 July 2011 – Halloween Horrors, the premier annual event at the Night Safari, returns this year with more macabre and hair-raising fun as the world’s first nocturnal animal park transforms into a circus of horrors. Themed as the “Carnival of Fear”, visitors will be immersed in maudlin scenes featuring freakish characters from both Western and Eastern genres. From creepy clowns and circus zombies to tormented nightclub performers and ghostly street hawkers, this year’s event will certainly not be for the faint-hearted.

Highlights include:

Train of Terror
Visitors will get thrills and chills as they embark on a journey through the site of a circus train wreck on the popular Train of Terror at the Night Safari. Watch out for escaped “animals” and dead circus performers such as Xavier the Illusionist and Booseye the Knife Thrower, as they come back to life in the dark of night. A note of caution: the clowns love to hunt in a pack.

Dr. Freako’s Midnight Trail
Visitors can take a walk through Dr. Freako’s Midnight Trail along the Forest Giant Trail. A mad scientist who conducted brutal and unorthodox animal-human experiments, Dr. Freako and his creations will be showcased in all their gory glory here. These “failed” experiments still linger around the lab, so visitors should enter at their own risk! Be warned – they have a distaste for humans and feed on blood-curdling screams.

Graveyard Haunts
The extinction graveyard near the “Creatures of the Night” show will be home to countless animal victims of modern mass extinction. Amidst the eerie howls of deceased animal spirits, guests will be taught a hard lesson on how humans have played a part in destroying these species.

Shanghai Fright Club
This year’s Halloween Horrors signature ‘house of horrors’ is a haunted Shanghai night club set in the 1940s and 50s. Street hawkers and performers of the Shanghai Tang will rule the roost with an eastern twist. Visitors should take heed of the roaming spirits who will lure them into their lair with glitz and glamour, and be prepared to scream their lungs out as they unveil the club’s darkest secrets.

Dress to Scare!
Come dressed in your most terrifying outfit on Halloween Horror nights. Get spotted by us and you stand a chance to win a $50 Wildlife Reserves Singapore voucher. A winner will be spotted on each of the 11 nights. All winners will enter a final round of judging where the grand winner will win attractive prizes.

Advisory Information
Due to the intense scare factor of this year’s theme, it is not suitable for toddlers and children. Parental guidance and discretion are strongly advised. More information will be available on www.halloweenhorrors.com.sg from August 2011.

Singapore, May 16, 2008 – The total number of animals donated to the Singapore Zoo and Night Safari rose to 460 in 2007, a sharp increase from the 118 animals donated in 2006. Jurong Bird Park received a total of 177 donations in 2007.

The majority of these were either brought in by the police or confiscated by the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA). Confiscations from AVA constituted a seven-fold jump from 25 to 175, over the previous year. The animals were mainly reptiles, and included star tortoises, green iguanas, fly-river turtles and Southeast Asian soft-shell turtles.

Donated animals are quarantined upon arrival, to prevent the potential spread of diseases to the rest of the parks’ animal collection. During the quarantine period, the animals are cared for and administered by the parks’ team of vets and keepers. The team inspects the animals for signs of injury and illness and provide them with a diet comprising appropriate food, nutritional supplements and medication, if necessary.

The need to feed and care for donated animals is a responsibility that the Wildlife Reserves Singapore (WRS) institutions take in their stride. Designated as Singapore’s official wildlife rescue centres, the Jurong BirdPark, Night Safari and Singapore Zoo are able to provide expert specialist care to a spectrum of exotic animals that enter the facilities. Over the last three decades, WRS parks have cared for and rescued more than 10,000 animals from all over the world, including Singapore.

The expertise to provide this assistance comes with years of experience in handling over 4,000 animals and 7,000 birds on a daily basis through the running of the three parks. WRS enjoy excellent relations and maintain constant communication with zoological institutions all over the world to keep abreast of the latest veterinary know-how. Staff are regularly sent on numerous overseas learning attachments, ensuring we are able to deal with anything from tarantulas to orang utans.

Ms Fanny Lai, CEO of Wildlife Reserves Singapore, said, “We see many cases each year of exotic animals brought in and subsequently abandoned when the host family realises they do not have the necessary skills or resources to care for them. These animals can be extremely difficult to upkeep and I strongly urge members of the public and animal lovers not to buy or raise exotic animals as pets.”

Management of donated animals
WRS’ parks manage these donations and confiscations in a variety of ways. Integration into the parks’ animal collection is one method. For example, a 2-week old slow loris that was donated by the public in August 2007 was hand-raised and is now in Night Safari’s collection. Slow lorises are listed on CITES Appendix I, which means trade in specimens of these species is permitted only in exceptional circumstances.

In August 2007, a total of 139 confiscated Southeast Asian soft-shell turtles were brought in. Thirty-two had to be euthanased and 107 housed in Singapore Zoo. Of these, 61 are now surviving and the population have since stabilised. These turtles are on CITES Appendix II, which includes species not necessarily threatened with extinction, but in which trade must be controlled in order to avoid utilisation incompatible with their survival. Also listed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, these turtles are considered to be facing a high risk of extinction in the wild.

Native wildlife that were donated to the parks, such as the pangolins, have been microchipped, rehabilitated and released back into the wild. Some exotic animals have also been repatriated to the various countries of origin or to other zoo collections to participate in breeding programmes. For example, 15 star tortoises were sent to Lisbon Zoo for display and breeding purposes in March this year. Another donated slow loris will be making its way to Augsburg Zoo in Germany this June. Two male-female pairs of white-handed gibbons were sent to Canada and Sri Lanka respectively in 2006. Two thousand star tortoises were sent back to India in 2002 and 15 shingle-back skinks, a green tree python and a crocodile skink were sent to Detroit Zoo for re-homing and breeding purposes.

WRS would like to urge the public not to import or keep exotic animals as pets. To reiterate, under The Endangered Species (Import and Export) Act (ESA) it is an offence to import and export any endangered species without a permit from AVA. It is also an offence to possess, sell, offer or expose for sale, or display to the public any of these species, if it has been illegally imported. Any person or company caught violating the ESA is liable to be prosecuted in Court and fined up to a maximum of S$50,000 for each animal or plant, and/or imprisoned for a term up to 2 years.